Heroes and icons: why 2016 was the year of loss

The list is remarkable and depressing. In music, we lost David Bowie, Leonard Cohen and Prince, but just look at some of the other greats of comedy, literature, architecture and politics we lost this year: Harper Lee, Victoria Wood, Ronnie Corbett, Terry Wogan, Zaha Hadid and perhaps the most shocking death of all: Jo Cox.

The generation that won the Second World War was also depleted further in 2016 with the loss of some of Scotland’s greatest men and women. Rugby, football and virtually every other sport had its losses too, including the greatest of them all: Muhammad Ali.

The year began with some of the biggest deaths of the year, including perhaps the biggest: David Bowie who, next to Elvis Presley and the Beatles, was the most influential and important musician in the history of pop music. The 69-year-old star made pop a playground but he also opened the door for pop music to talk openly about sexuality when he declared that he was bisexual.

In January, the music industry lost Glenn Frey too, the founding member of the country rock band The Eagles who, with Don Henley, wrote and sang most of the band’s hits including Best of My Love and Desperado.

January also saw the death at 69 of Alan Rickman, the film and theatre actor best known for movie roles in films such as the Harry Potter franchise in which he played Professor Snape, and Sir Terry Wogan, the DJ and broadcaster who became one of the most skilled, popular and enduring broadcasters of his generation. He was the presenter of Children In Need, the genial breakfast DJ on Radio 2 and the wonderfully sarcastic, blistering host of the Eurovision Song Contest.

The other losses in January included Cecil Parkinson, the Conservative politician who will be remembered as the comeback king of British politics at the height of Thatcherism and Sir Albert McQuarrie, the businessman and robust Scottish Tory MP.

By February, many were already beginning to ask whether 2016 would be an exceptional year for the death of well-known people. There was Boutros Boutros-Ghali, the former Secretary General of the United Nations who led the world body through global turmoil. He headed the UN from 1992 to 1996 - chaotic years marked by war in the former Yugoslavia and famine and genocide in Africa.

There was also 89-year-old Harper Lee, the author of To Kill a Mockingbird, one of the biggest selling novels of all time; Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, the great composer who was often inspired by the environment, including Orkney where he lived for many years; and from the world of acting and comedy Frank Kelly, the 77-year-old Irish actor who became internationally famous as the scabrous, drunken, violent but strangely loveable priest Father Jack Hackett in the television comedy Father Ted.

The prominent Scots lost in February included Tom Hunter, the walker and lover of the outdoors who proposed the idea of the West Highland Way.

Then in March, there was the loss, at 85 years old, of one of the famous Scots of all time: Ronnie Corbett, one of the Two Ronnies and star of one of the most famous sketches of all time: the spoof on the class system on The Frost Report in 1966. He also much loved for his television monologues, delivered from the edge of an oversized chair.

Tony Warren, the revolutionary writer and creator of Coronation Street, also died in February, as well as Nancy Reagan, the actress and powerful First Lady of the United States who proved herself an aggressive supporter of her husband, former president Ronald Reagan.

Dame Zaha Hadid, the architect, also died in March aged 65. One of the most fashionable and influential architects of her generation, her first building in the UK was the Maggie’s care centre at Kirkcaldy - she also created the Riverside transport museum in Glasgow, the Aquatics Centre for the London Olympics and the Evelyn Grace Academy in Brixton, which won the Stirling Prize in 2011.

There was also the death in March of Paul Daniels, the entertainer and magician, and the Glaswegian impresario Michael White, who was responsible for some of the biggest stage and movie hits of all time, including The Rocky Horror Picture Show. Sport also lost Bobby Carroll, the footballer who played for Celtic, St Mirren, and Dundee United.

There was no let-up in April, with one of the most shocking deaths of the year: Victoria Wood. A comedian, songwriter and actress much loved for sketches, sit-coms and songs that delighted in the silliness of ordinary life, she died of cancer aged just 62. April also saw the loss of one of the great geniuses of pop, Prince: flamboyant, prolific and probably guitarist of his generation.

April was also a bad month for the loss of many prominent Scots. They included the mathematician and expert on climate change Sir David MacKay; Ronald Ireland, the former sheriff principal of the Highlands; and Rachel Johnson, the last surviving former resident of St Kilda. Rachel was just eight years old when all 36 St Kildans were evacuated to mainland Scotland at their own request in 1930.

Two prominent Scottish veterans also died in April: James Mackenzie Simpson, a soldier who piped D-Company of his Black Watch battalion into battle at El Alamein, and Albert E F Young, a survivor of the Arctic Convoys, which ferried vital arms and supplies to Britain’s Soviet allies during the Second World War.

In May, there were several significant deaths in the sporting world. There was Hilda Jamieson, who died aged 102 and was Scotland’s, the UK’s and very possibly the world’s oldest active skier and a champion of the sport who built the now popular Glenshee Ski Centre.

There was also Susan Newlands, a 71-year-old Scot who pioneered women’s football in Scotland in the 1960s and 70s. We also lost Johnny Coyle, one of Dundee United’s most impressive goal scorers, and the rugby international Gordon Strachan, who was capped for his country five times.

May also saw the loss of Carla Lane, the 87-year-old comedy writer who did more than any other to bring the lives of women to the forefront of the sitcom. She wrote Butterflies, The Liver Birds and Bread, but in later years, she was also known as a passionate campaigner for animals.

Then there was June, which saw the most shocking death of all: the murder of Jo Cox, the 41-year-old Labour MP who was murdered in the days before the EU referendum. The world of politics and activism also lost Betty Brown, the 87-year-old teacher, politician and activist from Clydebank who made headlines for her work as a peace campaigner and political campaigner.

June also saw a death that was anticipated because of his health problems but was still upsetting for sports fans: Muhammad Ali, who died at the beginning of the month aged 74. His achievements in the boxing ring were extraordinary, but outside of it he also articulated opposition to the Vietnam War. “I ain’t got no quarrel with them Vietcong,” he said. In the obituaries, there was no doubting his unofficial title: The Greatest.

In July, the world of comedy suffered one of its greatest losses with the death, at 52 from cancer, of Caroline Aherne, who became famous as the acerbic granny and chat show host Mrs Merton but whose great triumph was The Royle Family.

And in August, there was another loss to comedy – 83-year-old Gene Wilder, who was one of the great comedy actors of the late 20th century and for many also the definitive Willy Wonka thanks to the classic 1971 family movie Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.

The prominent Scots lost in August included Maggie Macdonald, the Gaelic singer and possessor of one of the Scottish music scene’s most distinctive and sweet-toned voices.

The Glasgow-born doctor Kate Robertson also died aged 94. Dr Robertson pursued a distinguished and dedicated career as a doctor in some of the most turbulent areas of Africa.

September saw the death of one of the all-time greats of sport: Arnold Palmer. Aged 87, Palmer was a legend of golf who did more than any other player to popularise the game and take it beyond the clubhouse to big audiences. In football, there was also the loss of Max Murray, who was a leading goalscorer for Rangers for three successive years in the late 1950s and holds the distinction of scoring the Ibrox club’s first goal in European competition.

The month then ended with the death at 93 of Shimon Peres, who served as both prime minister and president of Israel and was a key figure in the Oslo Accords, the attempt in the 1990s to negotiate peace between the country and the Palestinian Authority.

October saw the loss of one of the great British cultural icons of the 20th century, Jean Alexander who was 90 and played Hilda Ogden in Coronation Street. Pete Burns, the androgynous, mouthy and provocative pop star, also died aged 57.

In October, there was the death too of Aberdonian Alistair Urquhart, the 97-year-old former prisoner of war who spent three-and-a-half terrifying years as a prisoner of the Japanese following the fall of Singapore. His memoir The Forgotten Highlander became an overnight success when it was published in his 92nd year.

There was also Angus R Grant, the musician and composer and as a member of the band Shooglenifty one of the most distinctive figures on the Scottish traditional music scene. And John Ainslie, the activist and coordinator of Scottish CND, who died aged 62.

Among the prominent Scottish women who died in October, there was Rev Betty Kinniburgh, a remarkable woman who was at the forefront of sweeping changes in the Church of Scotland in the 1960s which allowed women to become ordained as ministers. There was also Valerie Hunter Gordon, the Highlander credited with inventing the disposable nappy, who died aged 94.

In November, there was no let-up in the extraordinary deaths. There was one of the greats of modern music, Leonard Cohen, who died aged 82 in November. He was perhaps best known for Hallelujah, which has been covered at least 300 times by other artists. There was also Fidel Castro, the former president of Cuba and leader of the Communist revolution, who for some was a great hero of socialism and for others cast a dark shadow over the Americas for nearly 50 years.

The deaths in November also included Sir Jimmy Young, one of the cornerstones of British broadcasting for more than three decades; the Irish novelist and playwright William Trevor; and Robert Vaughn, the actor and star of The Man From U.N.C.L.E.

And so to December, which did nothing to change 2016’s reputation. At the beginning of the month, there was AA Gill, the novelist and writer who died of cancer aged 62.

Then there was Zsa Zsa Gabor, the 99-year-old actress, socialite and serial wife famous for her one-liners including “I am a marvellous housekeeper - every time I leave a man I keep his house.”

And Andrew Sachs of course, the much-loved actor who played Manuel, the hopeless Spanish waiter in Fawlty Towers. He created a character who was not only one of the most iconic in the history of sitcom, but the most popular character on one of Britain’s most loved shows.

Lionel Blue, the broadcaster, Jewish cleric and the first British rabbi openly to declare his homosexuality, also died, as well as the eccentric and popular Scottish weather man Ian McCaskill, John Glenn, the astronaut and the first American to orbit the Earth, and Rick Parfitt, the old-school rocker who found a winning formula as the core, with Francis Rossi, of Status Quo.

And then, just when we thought it might all be over, there was George Michael, the great pop star of the 1980s and yet another cultural icon to go in 2016. It was another great blow to music, but it was also a reminder that, quite apart from everything else that has happened this year, 2016 will undoubtedly be the year of loss.